I was 10, it was a Tuesday. I was home sick from school. I was set up on the couch in the living room, I had a bowl of cereal and was surrounded by blankets. I was watching some cartoon, and suddenly the channel switched over to a news report, about some building. I remember switching through the channels trying to find something else...but the exact same image was on every channel. Over the next few hours I watched it all unfold. I don't remember it vividly, but I remember certain elements of it.
I remember the first tower falling. I remember the screams. I remember the look on the news anchors face. I remember the disbelief. After that it's all a bit of a smear.
And then life went on. I went to school the next day, and there was something different in the air, but I'm pretty sure I'm only realizing it looking back on it. And then I spent the entirety of my teen years growing up with the Bush administration.
Of course at the time I couldn't truly understand what was happening, it was just the thing stopping me from watching cartoons. Only as I grew up did I really understand what was watching that day. It's funny how that works.
You know, I can't even remember a time when the US wasn't in the middle east. It's always just been a fact of life for me. It's scary.